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Child Benefit Case 4

Question At Issue:

Whether to the appellant’s claim to Child Benefit may be paid with effect from a date in 1991 when she moved from the United Kingdom to Ireland.

Background:

The appellant and her family had moved to Ireland in the early 1990s but continued to draw Child Benefit from the United Kingdom. When the authorities there became aware of the situation, payment was stopped and recovery sought for payment made in the period from 1991 to 2000, amounting to some £9,000 sterling. The appellant claimed Child Benefit in Ireland but the Deciding Officer rejected her request to have payment backdated on grounds that she had not shown good cause for the failure to claim within the prescribed period.

In her written submission, the appellant said that she was under the impression that the United Kingdom paid Child Benefit for children born there and that her residence in Ireland was not intended to have been permanent. She submitted that she continued to claim Child Benefit from the United Kingdom, reasoning that it was payable in either country. She contended that if she had no entitlement to the Child Benefit she had claimed, then she certainly had entitlement to Irish Child Benefit and, furthermore, that such entitlement should be offset against the overpayment assessed by the social security authorities in the United Kingdom. The appellant submitted also that the family had not moved to Ireland in 1991 but some time in 1992, and she supplied documentary evidence in support of this assertion.

The Appeals Officer determined this appeal on a summary basis.

Consideration of the Appeals Officer:

The Appeals Officer noted that Child Benefit is a universal payment in both Ireland and the United Kingdom and that the appellant had satisfied the qualifying conditions in both countries. He observed that she was effectively penalised, however, in being denied payment in both countries. He considered that the decision to reject her claim for backdated payment might be tenable were she seeking a simple retrospective award of Child Benefit, provided for under the Social Welfare (Consolidated Payments Provisions) Regulations, 1994. He noted, however, that it is accepted that a claim for benefit in any State, covered by EU Regulations, may be regarded as a claim for a similar type of payment in Ireland.

He considered that, whatever the merits of the appellant’s submission as to her failure to claim Child Benefit within the appropriate time, the case was altered by the efforts of the authorities in the United Kingdom, with the assistance of the Department of Social and Family Affairs, to recover the Child Benefit paid by them. He took the view that this marked a departure from the ‘proportionality doctrine’, provided for in administrative law, which requires an administrative body to maintain a proper balance between any adverse effects which its decision may have and the purpose which it pursues. He considered that while it was reasonable that the Regulations governing late claims should seek to impose some order on the manner in which a claim may be made, the provisions of that legislation were not intended to support the recovery of an overpayment or over-issue. He noted that the appellant was not seeking to have any retrospective payment made but sought to avoid the overpayment being imposed.

The Appeals Officer noted that the Department of Social and Family Affairs had in place arrangements to refund overlapping payments to the social security authorities in the United Kingdom. He concluded that the only fair course of action was to award Child Benefit as and from 1992, with the specified date to be agreed with the authorities in the United Kingdom as that from which Child Benefit ceased to be payable there. He determined that entitlement to benefit in this State should be offset against the overpayment assessed by the United Kingdom authorities.

Outcome:

Appeal allowed.

End of Document